I thought tonight I’d post an animal shot from my weekend trip to Northwest Trek.  I wanted to post something impressive so I decided I’d start with a bull Elk.  These were amazing animals and are one of the largest species of deer in North America.  They live in and on the edge of forest land, live off plants, grass, leaves and bark and are native to North America and Eastern Asia.

The males (known as bulls) have large antlers, these are covered in a fine fur or velvet.  Some ranches in the US collect Elk antlers for this velvet and sell it in Asia where it’s used for medicine – in some cultures it’s considered an aphrodisiac – yuk.  The good news is this doesn’t hurt the Elk as they lose their antlers every year.

The tour guide taking us round told us that as the antlers contain blood which feeds the velvet and when the Elk start to rub their antlers against trees (or fight each other), they sometimes end up walking about covered in blood – sounds lovely!  The guide said it looks worse than it is – what I want to know is how does he know?  He’s not an Elk!

When the antlers fall off at Northwest Trek (they start growing in Spring and fall off in Winter), they are left on the floor as a number of animals (including Elk) chew on them.  Sounds disgusting I know but we were told they contain minerals the animals need.  We were also told that the Elk live in herd’s and the bull with the biggest antlers get’s all the cows (female Elk).

The one in this picture was looking pretty pleased with himself, and no matter what we did, he just stared, I suspect he was the dominant male and was keeping an eye on us.   The park had a pretty big herd and they are clearly used to visitors and just wander around the park.  You start to wonder after a while who is watching who.  There we were stuck in a small bus with no windows and the Elk had the run of the place.  Still pretty cool though.

Tonight Carter was left at home alone so he decided to play with his toys, I mean action figures!